Hands
by dimestoredramatic
Summary: Romeo's thoughts, after killing Tybalt. Romeo/Tybalt one-sided slash. Very AU.


Disclaimer: Yeah, I own Romeo and Juliet. Like that would ever happen.

AN: I didn't want to write this. I was FORCED to. Anyways, the details about the fight might be off, because I haven't read R&J in ages, but this is AU anyway, so it doesn't need to be perfect. And here we go.

* * *

You stare at your hands, your fingers slender, spindly; your hands do not know it, but they are monsters. Earlier today, they slew Tybalt; earlier today, they slew the one person that held your world in their hands. You'd always thought hands were beautiful; hands are used to create, to construct, to craft.

Your hands are used for destruction.

You have already imagined every possible outcome of that situation; everything you could have done, instead of killing the only man you would ever give your heart to. Tybalt killed Mercutio. You can repeat that sentence a million times over and it will never make any more sense to you. Mercutio died and with him, your rationality. It was Tybalt who killed Mercutio, but you never saw the man you loved; you saw only a murderer. You saw someone whose life you had to end, because if Mercutio was gone then the man who killed him had to be gone too.

In an instant of bewildering, heartstopping insanity, you killed the one person who made you feel alive.

Tybalt never knew how you longed to woo him with gentle verses and sweet songs; he could never know, because you were Romeo and he was Tybalt and quite apart from being of rival families, you were two men and that was never going to happen.

Even if it could have happened, it certainly wasn't going to now; not with Tybalt dead and buried.

Your hands are pale as ivory, their colour flushed out with terror and hopelessness. Your hands are white, but all you can see is red, red from the wound you inflicted on Tybalt and red from the wound he inflicted on Mercutio.

Tybalt is the only man you've ever killed, and isn't it ironic that he is also the only man you've ever loved? You didn't kill Mercutio, but his death was so unavoidably your fault that you might as well have. Tybalt killed Mercutio, but the person he really wanted to kill was you.

You don't pretend that that doesn't tear you up inside. Tybalt wanted you dead and you would willingly have died for him; how does it then work out that you are well and breathing while Tybalt will never get the chance to breathe again?

You think you would give anything for it to have been you in his stead.

If it had been anyone but Mercutio, _anyone_ but your dear friend Mercutio, then this wouldn't have happened. You could've kept your head, could've talked it out. But it _was_ Mercutio, and there's no changing that. There's no changing the fact that you went into a blind rage and killed Tybalt.

It's a shame, really, because if you'd just let Tybalt kill you from the beginning, then he and Mercutio would still be alive. You're dead either way, because with your best friend and the love of your life dead, you can't even see anything worth living for.

Your death could have solved everything and now it's too late. Why, why couldn't you have fought Tybalt when he requested you do so? If you didn't want to hurt him, you could have submitted. You'd be dead, but it would be worth it, you're certain. Instead, you let Mercutio fight for you, because the idea of lifting a weapon against Tybalt shattered your heart. Look where that thinking got you.

You ended up lifting a weapon against him anyway.

You're dull and lifeless and everyone thinks it's because of Mercutio; you feel guilty because it _was_ about Mercutio and that's why you ended Tybalt's life. It's not about Mercutio anymore, but you can't tell them that, because loving your enemy is pretty much treason where your family is concerned. Treason; the idea makes you laugh, because you have commited the worst betrayal imagineable, but it wasn't the betrayal of your family.

It was the betrayal of the one you loved, and there couldn't possibly be a worse betrayal than murder.

You're a poisonous person, with monstrous killing machines where your hands should be and a tainted little black heart. You think this pain could almost be endured, if only you didn't have to see your hands, every day, reminding you of your treachery. If only you could scrub off all the invisible blood that is etched into your fingers, engraved into every crack in your skin.

People always say that you can if yourself to death and secretly you wish it were true. You wish you could think of so many questions, so many 'if' scenarios that you'll suddenly drop down dead. You have an overwhelming need to die, but you don't know how to accomplish it.

You'd kill yourself, but your hands have wreaked enough murder. You'd never want to kill yourself, because you need to be released from your murderous self before you commit another murder; killing yourself would accomplish exactly that which you do not wish to do.

You stare at your hands, their redness taunting you, and before you can resist, before you can even stop yourself, you've taken out your sword. You can't bare to watch, but somehow you also can't bare to look away; your destructive left hand is cutting off your destructive right hand, and all you can do is watch in some sort of morbid fascination. It's sickening and horrifying and yet so beautiful and now you're happy, because you can see the blood on your hands, it's right _there_, and you knew it was always real.

Your other hand is still there, gripped around your sword. It irks you that it's still there, still untarnished, still unbloodied. It's still whole, and that's somehow unfitting, as though it should be fragmented like your broken heart. You'd like to have it dripping in scarlet too, but already you're fading from consciousness and anyway, you wouldn't be able to hold the sword. It scares you, because with one hand, you can still cause demolition and you'd like to prevent that at all costs.

When you black out, you're not worrying about dying, you're thinking how much you wish you could have taken away your other hand too.


End file.
